era 



x1fc30. 



hi] 





ACCESSION NQ. 



CLASSIFICATION 




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^^ ^^. 



^^-^^-.i^- 



G E A N T 



HIS CAMPAIGNS 



A MILITARY BIOGRAPHY. 



HENRY OOPPEE, A. M., 



EDITOR OF THE UNITED STATES SERVICE {MAGAZINE.: 




NEW YORK: 

CHARLES B. RICHARDSON 

CINCINNATI: C. F. VENT & CO. 

1865. 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1865. 
By CHAKLES B. RICHARDSON, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern 
District of New York. 




ALVOUn. I'RINTBR. 



> 






\S PREFATORY LETTER 

FROM THE AUTHOR TO THE PUBLISHER. 



Univeksity of Penxsylvania, ) 
PniLADELi'iiiA, July 1, 1865. ) 

My Deae Sir: — It is with peculiar pleasure that I 
have undertaken to write the military biography of 
Lieutenant- General Grant, because, having known 
him from boyhood, I have watched the successive steps 
and symmetrical development of his character, and tind 
in his complete and rounded life not a single point which 
will require me to trim my pen for the purposes of cham- 
pionship, extenuation, or palliation. We were cadets 
together, and I now see how the cadet of 1840 exhibited 
qualities, not then very striking indeed, but which only 
needed fostering and opportunity to make him the gener- 
alissimo of 1865. The task is, therefore, divested of the 
chief difficulty which usually besets the biographer. It 
is to tell a plain story, not to make out a case. 

Political history, it is justly said, can only be fairly 
written when the chief actors have passed away, when 
party prejudices are removed or tempered by time, when 
men not only dare to say, but wish to say, and to hear, 
the truth, with no longer any concern about personal feel- 
ings, and when, more than all, we arrive at such a distant 
point of view, that we take in the entire field of action, 
and establish a proper co-ordination and relation between 
1 



2 PREFATORY LETTER. 

the parts that make up the great Avhole. This is far less 
true of military history. The military art is not based 
upon policy and expediency, but upon exact mathematics. 
Something, it is true, must be allowed to chance, some- 
thing to the admixture of the political element ; and local 
heroes must be sometimes bolstered for a time at the 
expense of truth. But when the great demonstration is 
fully made, we can calculate and eliminate from the record 
the fortuitous circumstances, and the unduly praised 
hero soon finds his proper level ; and so it happens that 
the great battle-problems, in their main features at least, 
are, within a short time, justly solved, and forever set- 
tled. Although half-informed men still wage furious 
controversy about Waterloo, we have learned but little 
new on that subject since it was first presented in the 
dispatches. Unwritten history can do little to affect the 
main features of Fort Donelson, Yicksburg, or the capture 
of Richmond. 

But General Grant's case is one of peculiar force. We 
are met in his career with no vexed questions, and few, 
if any, doubtful ones. There are not two parties about 
his fame. He has done so much, and done all so well, 
that our only concern must be to place his deeds most 
carefully on record, in order that the world may know, 
fully and in detail, what they have admired in grand out- 
line ; and this is my purpose. 

I have great pride in knowing that I undertake the 
work, not only with General Grant's sanction, but "vvith 
his exclusive promise of every assistance. He has di- 
rected material and maps to be put in my hands, which 
cannot otherwise be obtained, and he and the gentlemen 
of his staff have offered to answer all questions, and sup- 
ply all I shall need to make the work a faithful historic 
record. He desires nothing more than this. 

Again, it is worthy of obs(M'vation, that the work could 
ji(»t liavc been i)r()porly undertaken before the present 



• PREFATORY LETTER. 3 

time. It is only now that his career, in this war, is a fait 
accompli. Until the destruction of the rebellion, he was 
only pledged to a certain and most arduous labor, and the 
verdict upon any former record of his life must be "In- 
complete !" True, he had already done much as a gen- 
eral, but the great work was not done ; the most brilliant 
chapter, before which all others pale their fires, could not 
before this have been written. There is no more brilliant 
chapter in any military life ! 

The plan of my biography will exhibit a clear chrono- 
logical history of General Grant's campaigns, illustrated 
by maps and diagrams furnished, and, in some cases, sug- 
gested by the General ; an occasional critical summary at 
the close of a campaign, connecting its prominent events, 
and presenting its military sequence ; and an appendix, 
containing the most important dispatches referred to in 
the text. Such trutliful anecdotes as I can gather, really 
illustrative of his character, I shall take great pleasure in 
inserting ; I shaU, however, make none for the purpose. 
In the course of the narrative I shall try my pen at 
sketches of the distinguished commanders who have exe- 
cuted Grant's plans. Many of them are old comrades and 
friends, and I can therefore speak from personal knowl- 
edge, without having recourse to loose fancies of rapid 
writers, who put themselves, but not their heroes, in 
print. 

I think I may safely promise the public that although 
the work might have been better done by other hands, 
they will find, in this volume, the truth carefully sifted 
from the great mass of materials, systematically digested, 
scientifically presented in a military point of view, and 
uninfluenced by prejudice of any kind whatever. 

In complying with your request to furnish a small por- 
tion of the volume to make up a specimen-book, I have 
thought best to send you a slight sketch of Grant' s youth 
and cadet-life, with a glimpse of him at the opening of the 



4 PREFATORY LETTER. 

war, and to supplement tliese with a picture of the same 
man, when, after a wonderful series of successes, as Lieu- 
tenant-General, he took the darkling world on his shoul- 
ders, and, as we since know, bore it, without staggering, 
until he could once more poise it, and send it anew upon 
its orbit of light and joyous life. 

These, it seemed to me, would best illustrate his char- 
acter ; while we ask the reader to wait for a short time 
only that we may depict, as vividly as our enthusiastic 
pen is able, 

" The story of his life 
From year to year, the battles, sieges, fortunes 
That he has passed," 

which interlink in iron chain-work the peaceful youth 
with the stormy, successful, illustrious manhood of our 
"great captain." 

Wishing for our joint project many readers, and a 
success worthy its subject, 

I am, very sincerely, yours, 

H. COPP^.E. 

C. B. RicnAUDsdx, Esq.. 

ruhlislior, 540 Broadway, N. Y. 



EXTRACT FROM CHAPTER I. 



The reverberation of Ruffin's cannon* went rolling 
over the land. It leaped the Blue Ridge, screamed 
through its wild passes, traversed the valleys of tributary 
streams, and poured in unabated thunder-tones upon the 
banks of the Mississippi. Everywhere it roused the pa- 
triots to action. The nation sprang to its feet. The whole 
country, but yesterday a people of compromisers and 
deprecators of civil war, now flew to arms. Volunteering 
was the order of the day : the enthusiasm was unbound- 
ed. Old men, with spectacles, and in unsightly jackets, 
nearly killed themselves at nightly home-guard drills in 
academies of music, concert rooms, and town balls ; small 
boys formed light-infantry companies ; women made hav- 
ersacks and havelocks— the latter of no earthly use ex- 
cept to awaken, or rather keep alive, a spirit of patriotic 
labor ; and men in the bloom of youth and prime of man- 
hood flocked to the rendezvous to take the fleld. 

It is true we did not know how to flght : we had no 
generals to lead us, except some old relics of our former 
wars. That fine old veteran. General Scott, had passed 
his seventieth year, and, from the effects of old wounds, 
was in no condition to take the field. Our army was but 

* " The first shot at Fort Sumter, from Stevens's Battery, was fired by 
the venerable Edmund Ruffin, of Virginia." — New York Herald, April 13, 
1861. On the 20th of June, 1865, this venerable gentleman blew out his 
brains : he certainly made two remarkable shots. 



(3 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

"tlie skeleton of the forty-eiglith," an army only in 
name ; our volunteers Avere willing, but entirely igno- 
rant ; our regulars had not been drilled at brigade ma- 
noeuvres, and their officers knew little about tliem. In 
most cases, before the war, there were not sufficient troops 
at the garrison-posts to drill at battalion manoeuvres. No 
one knew how extensive the theatre of war was to be ; on 
what a scale the rebels had been preparing to carry it on ; 
what we should need in the way of an army, of supplies and 
munitions of war : we were certain of one thing, and that 
was that we were deficient in every thing. Even the 
strategic features of the country— unlike those of Europe, 
where every little rivulet and mountain-spur has been 
fought over, and has its military place in history — had 
never been studied. Perhaps it was incident to this state 
of things that statesmen spoke oracularly of "no war," 
or "one effective blow," or "sixty days," for which to 
discount the struggle. But in spite of their predictions 
the storm grew apace, and, in the midst of obscurity, we 
blundered on in ignorant and absurd experiments. Speak 
but of a man who could aid us, suggest a hero, and the 
people turned to him with the blind Avorship of helpless 
fear. Not what he had done, but what he was going to 
do, made him illustrious : he was already a new incarna- 
tion of the god of war ; a second Napoleon come to battle. 
It is both needless and useless now to demonstrate how 
unjust this was to those thus bepraised, and what sore 
humiliation it was to bring upon the worshippers. But 
there was no calm Judgment then ; the danger was immi- 
nent, the need urgent, the fear great. At last the light- 
ning fell, and Bull Run Avas followed by a horror of 
great darkness over the land,— the darkest hour before 
the daAvn. 

Tlie truth is, there was no man at that tiivu^ in AuKM-ica 
who could grasp the colossal problem ; no man on either 
side. We were babes in military ])ractice ; our armies 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 7 

and onr generals needed education from the very element- 
ary principles, and especially that education of mistakes, 
which Marmont declares to be the very best of all. The 
Grant of Belmont could not have fought the battle of 
Pittsburg Landing, and it needed the practice of Vicks- 
burg and Chattanooga to fit him for the terrible struggles 
of the campaign from the Rapidan. 

Months and years passed, and we became gradually 
enlightened ; our troops became veterans, and our lead- 
ers, carefully sifted, became generals. None are now in- 
vested Avith honors who have not fully earned them, and 
we stand to-day at the open portals of that glorious ]3eace 
which our defenders have achieved, ready to accord them 
intelligent praise in proportion to their real merits. And 
thus we reach the life of Lieutenant- General Grant, one 
of the many who rushed to the field when Rufiin' s can- 
non sounded the alarm — a graduate of West Point, edu- 
cated, indeed, as a subordinate officer, but not as a gen- 
eral ; to be educated in and by the war. His career, 
beginning with the Sumter gun, is in itself an epitome of 
the war, and marks its grandest epoch when armed rebel- 
lion threw down its weapons, and the country, more by 
his power than by that of any other individual man, 
stood new-born, with a giant' s strength, and, in the often 
quoted words of Curran, never elsewhere so applicable, 
"redeemed, regenerated, and disenthralled, by the irre- 
sistible genius of universal emancipation." 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 



CHAPTER II. 

Grant was a true autochthon, a son of the soil, heir 
to no splendid heritage, but to the nobility of labor. His 
early history needs but little comment. Born of respect- 
able parents to the honorable sturdy life of the West, he 
needs no exhibition of long descent to inaugurate his his- 
tory. If Napoleon could rebuke the genealogist, who 
was creating for him a pedigree, with the words, "Friend, 
my patent dates from Monte Notte," Grant may claim his 
American nobility from Fort Donelson. 

On the one hand, all efforts to establish an aristocratic 
descent and a remarkable childhood for such a man, are 
dishonest and absurd ; and, on the other hand, all at- 
tempts to make his antecedents very humble and his 
childhood very hard, in order to exalt his after life, are 
disgusting. The one is absurdly European, and the other 
belongs to the ' ' new American school of biograpln', ' ' 
the tendency of which is to make boys despise their 
fathers, that they may the more thoroughly respect them- 
selves.* 

We may, however, place on record what is truthfull}' 
known of his family and childhood, being sure that there 
is nothing in Gi'ant's past upon which he does not look 
with honest pride. 

His father is Jesse R. Grant, the descendant of a Scot- 

* See an exuellcnt arliolc, by Gail Hamilton^ in "Skirmislios and 
Sketches," in which, with the vindictiveness of Ilerod, slie shuightcrs the 
" BoMiiii Boys," "Ferry Boys," "Errand Boys," "Tanner Boys," itc, «&c. 
Lot ns ho])e she has killed all the "innocents." 










^. ^ 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 9 

tisli family, first represented in this country by two bro- 
thers, who emigrated to what were then the American 
colonies, early in the eighteenth century, of whom one 
settled in Canada and the other in New Jersey. Jesse 
Grant, who comes from the New Jersey branch, was born 
in Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, in 1794. In 
1805 his father died, and Jesse, then an orphan of eleven 
years, was apprenticed to a tanner. We need not trace 
the wanderings of Jesse Grant with his mother and family, 
from Pennsylvania to Maysville in Kentucky, then to Ra- 
venna, thence to Ohio. The country was in a disordered 
state by reason of British intrigue with Indian barbarity ; 
in many parts the climate was unhealthy, and so we find 
him, after many changes to better his lot, residing at Point 
Pleasant, Clermont County, Ohio. 

Grant' s mother was Hannah Simpson, the daughter of 
John Simpson. She was born in Montgomery County, 
Pennsylvania ; but removed with her father and family 
to Clermont County, Ohio, in 1818, where, in June, 1821, 
she married Jesse E.. Grant. Ten months after, on the 
twenty-seventh of April, 1822, their first child, known to 
the world as Ulysses Simpson Grant,* was born in a 
small one -story cottage, still standing on the banks of the 
Ohio, commanding a view of the river and of the Ken- 
tucky shore. 

From what we know of Grant' s parents — the probity, 
energy, and hard labor of his father ; the consistent Chris- 
tian character, kind heart, and devotion to her family 
displayed by his excellent mother — we have another beau- 
tiful illustration of the moral heritage of children, and 
another proof that God shows mercy and gives great 
reward to them that love him, to many generations. 

* There is a story that he was named Hiram Ulysses, but that his 
cadet warrant was made out for Ulysses Sydney ; that he accepted the 
name while at West Point, only changing it to Ulysses Simpson, in honor 
of his mother, when he graduated. 



10 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

Many stories are told, of course, exhibiting the sturdy 
character of young Grant, and his resources under diffi- 
culties, but none betokening in a remarkable degree the 
character of his future career. It is said that, upon 
proper occasion, he could be pugnacious ; that he was 
not outwitted in a bargain ; and that he contrived means 
of overcoming difficulties which would have checked 
other boys. In the same way, the biographers of Napo- 
leon have found the types of his after life, in his lording 
it over his elder brother Joseph, and in his bravery in 
attacking snow forts. 

Grant was sturdy, strong, and cool, as many other boys 
are, but up to the time of his first entry into service no 
events or actions of his life were the heralds of his present 
greatness. The qualities undoubtedly were there, but 
latent ; and of what has evoked them in most men, am- 
bition, he seemed to have none. 

The education of the boy was quite limited, like that 
of most Western boys in moderate circumstances. There 
was hard work to do, in Avhich the son must help the 
father, and so it was only in the midwinter months that 
he could attend the village school. What he learned, 
however, he learned well, and he acquired with the ele- 
ments of knowledge, not only a basis, but, what is of far 
more importance, an ardent desire for a full education. 

By the time Grant was seventeen, West Point had 
acquired great fame throughout the country ; it was 
known by its fruits ; its eUces were gentlemen of high 
education and noble bearing. In civic life they were 
e»agerly sought after to take the lead in railway engineer- 
ing and industrial pursuits. They were the chief men 
in all militia organizations ; indeed the military knowl- 
edge of the country was almost as much confined to them 
as the esoteric meaning of the Egyptian mysteries had for- 
merly been to the priests. It was also known that there 
a boy, without the nect^ssary means, could obtain the best 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. H 

education which the country could afford, not gratui- 
tously, but more : he would be paid for learning, trained 
and maintained as a gentleman, and would receive at the 
last a high, self-sustaining position — a commission in the 
army. To such a youth as Grant, it offered a splendid 
chance, and so application was made to the Honorable 
Thomas L. Hamer, of Grant's congressional district, who 
gave him the appointment. Thus, with a good basis of 
hard, self-reliant, and eager boyhood, he was admitted to 
the preliminary examination, and entered the Military 
Academy on the first of July, 1839.* Such are the de- 
tails which would have had no importance whatever, had 
it not been for subsequent events. 

Even a step farther we may follow him without any 
temptation to worship the incipient hero. His scholar- 
ship at AYest Point was respectable and no more. He 
went through the entire course, like his classmates, no 
cadet being allowed any option, f From September to 
June, the cadets are in bai-racks, studying, riding, and 
fencing in the riding-hall, and, in fine weather, drilling in 
the afternoons at infantry ; from June to September, they 
encamp upon the plain, and their time is entirely em- 
ployed in drills of every kind, guard duty, pyrotechny, 
and practical engineering. 

In his cadet studies, Grant had something to contend 
with in the fact of his own lack of early preparation, and 
the superior preparation of most of his competitors, who 
had been over a part of the course before they entered. 
Among these were William B. Franklin, who stood at 
the head of the class ; Roswell S. Ripley, not famous 
for his "History of the Mexican AVar" (written in the 
interest of General Pillow, and to injure Gent^ral Scott), 

* The preliminary examination is extremely simple — reading, spelling, 
writing, and arithmetic through decimal fractions. 

t In our day, it was only the first section of each class who learned 
something more than was required of the rest. 



12 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

but quite infamous for firing with great rapidity upon 
the burning Sumter, which the devoted garrison were 
trying to extinguish ; Rufus Ingalls, the excellent quar- 
termaster-general of the Army of the Potomac ; Joseph 
J. Reynolds, late commander in Arkansas ; Christopher 
C. Augur, long in command at Washington ; the rebel 
General Franklin Gardner, who surrendered Port Hud- 
son to Banks when Grant had taken Vicksburg ; and 
others, to whom we design no discredit by not mention- 
ing them. Thirty-nine of the one hiindred and more who 
had been appointed in 1839, graduated in 1843. Grant 
was the independent middle man, twenty-first on the list. 
The honor of being his comrade for two years at the 
Academy, enables me to speak more intelligently, per- 
haps, than those of "the new school," who have invented 
the most absurd stories to illustrate his cadet-life, I 
remember him as a plain, common-sense, straight-forward 
youth ; quiet, rather of the old-head-on-young-shoulders 
order, shunning notoriety ; quite contented, while others 
were grumbling ; taking to his military duties in a very 
business-like manner ; not a prominent man in the corps, 
but respected by all, and very popular with his friends. 
His sobriquet of Uncle Sam was given to him tliere, 
where every good fellow has a nickname, from these very 
qualities ; indeed, he was a very uncle-like sort of a 
youth. He was then and always an excellent horseman, 
and his picture rises before me as I write, in the old torn 
coat,* obsolescent leather gig-top, loose riding pantaloons, 
with spurs buckled over them, going with his clanking 
sabre to the drill-hall.. He exhibited but little entliu- 
siasm in any thing : his best standing was in the math- 
ematical branches and their application to tactics and 
military engineering. 

* Ridiiifr-jackots, if we rcinembor rij^litly, IkuI not tlien been issued, 
and the cadets ahvavs wore tlieir seediest ri^: into the sweat and dust of 
the riding-drill. 




GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 13 

If we agaiu dwell upon the fact that no one, even of 
his most intimate friends, dreamed of a great future for 
him, it is to add that, looking back now, we must confess 
that the possession of many excellent qualities, and the 
entire absence of all low and mean ones, establish a 
logical sequence from first to last, and illustrate, in a 
novel manner, the poet' s fancy about 

" The baby figures of the giant mass 
Of things to come at large," 

the germs of those qualities which are found in beautiful 
combination in Wordsworth's "Happy Warrior :" 

" The generous spirit who, when brought 
Among the tasks of real life, hath wrought 
"Upon the plan that pleased his infant thought." 

And at this point of view, as we find the Western boy, 
after the compacting, instructing, developing processes of 
West Point, coming forth, a man, ready for the stern real- 
ities of American life, we may pause to point him out to 
our American youth as an example henceforth to be fol- 
lowed ; then, as now, a character which, in the words of a 
friend, "betrayed no trust, falsified no word, violated no 
rights, manifested no tyranny, sought no personal aggran- 
dizement, complained of no hardship, displayed no jeal- 
ousy, oppressed no subordinate ; but, in whatever sphere, 
protected every interest, upheld his flag, and was ever 
known by his humanity, sagacity, courage, and honor." 
What more can be claimed for any young man ? What 
for the greatest of captains 1 

He left West Point as brevet second-lieutenant in the 
Fourth Infantry ; and with his army life we begin an- 
other chapter in his history. 



14 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 



CHAPTER III. 

Ox the 1st of July, 1843, Grant began his army service 
as brevet second-lieutenant in the Fourth Infantry. The 
explanation of this is, that there being no vacancy in the 
infantry arm, all graduated cadets are thus attached, in 
the order of merit, to regiments, as supernumerary officers, 
each to await a vacancy in his turn. The regiment was 
then at Jefferson Barracks, near St. Louis, Missouri ; but, 
in the summer of 1844, it was removed to Natchitoches, 
La., and, as the Mexican plot thickened, in 1845, it was 
sent to Corpus Christi, to watch the Mexican army then 
concentrating upon the frontier. Grant was made a full 
second-lieutenant in the seventh regiment on the 30th of 
September, 1845. But he had formed an attachment for 
the fourth, and applied to remain in it ; this was granted 
by the War Department. He was fortunate enough to 
be at Palo Alto and Resaca, May 6 and 7, 1846, the trial 
fights of the American army against a civilized enemy, 
after thirty years of peace ; and he participated in the 
bloody battle of Monterey, September 23, 1846. His re- 
giment was soon after called away from General Taylor' s 
command, to join General Scott in his splendid campaign 
from Vera Cruz to Mexico, two hundred and seventy- 
two miles in the heart of the enemy's country. He was 
at the siege and capture of Yera Cruz, March 29, 1847, 
and on April 1, preparatory to the advance, lie was ap- 
pointed regimental quarter-master, a post whicli he held 
during the remainder of the war. It is a position re- 
quiring system and patience, and drawing a small addi- 



GRANT AND HIS CMIPAIGNS. 15 

tional pay ; it is usually conferred upon some solid, ener- 
getic, pains-taking officer, not necessarily one remarkal)le 
for dash and valor. Being in charge of the regimental 
equipage and trains, the quarter-master may, without 
impropriety, remain with these during actual battle, as 
we have known many to do. It is, therefore, recorded 
as greatly to the praise of Grant, that he always joined 
his regiment in battle, and shared their fighting. At 
Molino del Rey, September 8, 1847, he was distin- 
guished, and was brevetted first-lieutenant for his ser- 
vices : this brevet, however, owing to the fact of his 
becoming a full first-lieutenant by the casualties of that 
battle, he declined. At Chapultepec, September 13, 1847, 
Grant joined, with a few of his men, some detachments of 
the second artillery, under Captain Horace Brooks, in an 
attack on the enemy's breastworks, served a mountain 
howitzer, and hastened the enemy' s retreat, and ' ' acquit- 
ted himself most nobly under the observation" of his 
regimental, brigade, and division commanders.* 

For this action Grant received the brevet of captain 
for "gallant and meritorious conduct," awarded in 1849, 
but not confirmed until 1850. 

His first-lieutenancy dated from September 16, 1847. 
It must not be supposed that these services during the 
Mexican war are now dressed up to assimilate with his 
after career. He was really distinguished in that war 
above most of those of his own rank.f 

* See General Worth's, Lieutenant-Colonel Garland's, and Major Fran- 
cis Lee's reports of that battle. 

t During our residence at the capital I remember a "horse story" 
about Grant, which has not appeared in the books, but which is, at least, 
true. He was an admirable horseman, and had a very spirited horse. 
A Mexican gentleman, with whom he was upon friendly terms, asked the 
loan of his horse. Grant said afterwards, "I was afraid he could not ride 
liini, and yet I knew if I said a word to that effect, the suspicious Spanish 
nature would think I did not wish to lend him." The result was the 



16 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

Upon the close of the war by the treaty promulgated 
in April, 1848, the Fourth Infantry was sent first to New 
York, and then to the Northern frontier, and for some 
time Grant served in the command of his company, first 
at Detroit, and then at Sackett' s Harbor. 

In August, 1848, he married Miss Dent, sister of 
his classmate, Frederick J. Dent, who resided in St. 
Louis. 

Incident to the acquisition of California and the won- 
derful discoveries of gold, troops were more necessary on 
our Western coast than elsewhere, to protect the emigrants 
and the new Pacific settlements from the depredations of 
the Indians. The Fourth Infantry was therefore ordered 
to Oregon, in the autumn of 1851, and one battalion, with 
which Brevet Captain Grant was serving, was ordered 
to Fort DaUas, where he saw some service against the 
Indians. 

After a two-years absence from his family, and with 
but little prospect of promotion in those " dull and piping 
times of peace," Grant, having been promoted to a full 
captaincy in August, 1853, resigned his commission in 
July 31, 1854, and set forth to commence life anew as a 
citizen. That he tried many shifts, does not betoken a 
fickle or volatile nature, but simply the invention which 
is born of necessity. As a small farmer, near St. Louis, 
ai ^ a dealer in wood, he made a precarious living ; * as a 

Mexican mounted liim, was tliruwii before he had gone two blocks, and 
killed on the spot. 

* I visited St. Lonis at this time, and remember with pleasure, that 
Grant, in his farmer rig, whip in hand, came to see me at the hotel, where 
were Joseph J. Reynolds, then Professor, now Major-General, General 
(then Major) D. C. Buell, and Major Chapman of the cavalry. If Grant 
had ever used spirits, as is not unlikely, I distinctly remember that, upon 
the proposal being made to drink. Grant said, I will go in and look at you, 
for I never drink any tiling; and the other officers, who saw him fre- 
quently, afterwards told me that he drank nothing but water. 




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GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 17 

money collector he did no more, having neither the nature 
to bully nor the meanness to wheedle the debtors. He 
could not 

" Crook the pregnant hinges of the knee 
That thrift may follow fawning." 

He is said also to have played the auctioneer ; but in this 
branch, unless he made longer speeches than he has since 
done, he could achieve no success. 

In 1859 he entered into partnership with his father, 
who had been prosperous in the tanning business, in a 
new leather and saddlery store in Galena, Illinois. Here, 
in a place of growing trade with Wisconsin, Iowa, and 
Minnesota, the industry, good sense, and honesty of 
Grant did at length achieve a certain and honorable suc- 
cess, and, had the rebellion not broken out, he would have 
had a local reputation in the firm of Grant & Son, as an 
admirable judge of leather, perhaps mayor of Galena, 
with a thoroughly well-mended sidewalk, visited always 
with pleasure by his old army friends travelling West- 
ward, but never heard of by the public. His greatest 
success had been achieved in the army ; his Mexican ex- 
perience gave glimpses of a future in that line ; he needed 
only opportunity, and he was to have it abundantly. 
Here, then, we mark a new epoch in his life— a sudden 
plunge unexpected and unheralded, — 

" The torrent's smoothness ere it dash below." 

2 



18 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 



CHAPTER IV. 

It may be easily conceived how the treachery of 
Southern leaders, the secession of South Carolina, and 
the hombardment of Fort Sumter aifected Grant. A 
decided Democrat before the Avar, he had, in his limited 
sphere, been in favor of conceding to the South all its 
rights, perhaps more ; but when the struggle actually 
began, his patriotism and military ardor were aroused to- 
gether. As a patriot, he was determined to support his 
Government and uphold his flag ; and as a soldier, he saw 
opening before him a career of distinction for which he 
had been educated, and in which he had already, in some 
degree, distinguished himself. In May he raised a com- 
pany in his own neighborhood, and marched with it to 
Springfield, the place of rendezvous. It was not long 
before Governor Yates, to whom he had been recom- 
mended by a member of Congress from his State, made 
use of Grant's experience in organizing the State trooj^s. 
He was appointed Adjutant- General of the State, and pro- 
ceeded to the difficult task of mustering the three-months 
men, which, amid much confusion, he accomplished by 
his indefatigable energy. While on a brief visit to his 
father, at Covington, Kentucky, Grant received a com- 
mission from the Governor as colonel of the Twenty-lirst 
Illinois Volunteers, three-months men. They subsequent- 
1}' iMilisted, owing to their confidence in him, one thousand 
strong, for three years' service. Grant's first concern Avas 
to drill and discipline his regiment, which soon b«'came 
marked for its excellent order. Removing them from 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 19 

their place of organization, Matoon, Illinois, to Caseyville, 
lie snperinteilded their drill ; and, not long after, he 
marched them, in default of railroad transportation, one 
hundred and twenty miles, to Quincy, on the Mississippi, 
which was supposed to be in danger. Thence he moved, 
under orders, to defend the line of the Hannibal and Hud- 
son Railroad, from Hannibal and Quincy, on the Missis- 
sippi, to St. Joseph, and here coming into contact with 
other regiments, his military knowledge and experience 
pointed to him, although the 5^oungest colonel, as the com- 
mander of the combined forces. As acting brigadier-gen- 
eral of this force, his head- quarters, on the 31st of July, 
1861, were at Mexico, Missouri. We need not detail the 
marches of Grant's regiments in the "District of North- 
ern Missouri" — as General Pope's command was called — 
to Pilot Knob and Ironton and Jefferson City, to defend 
the river against the projected attacks of Jeff. Thompson. 
In August he received his commission as brigadier-general 
of volunteers, to date from May 17. He was seventeenth 
in a list of thirty-four original appointments of that date. 
He was ordered to proceed to Cairo, and there, with two 
brigades, he took command of the important strategic ter- 
ritory entitled "The District of Southeast Missouri," in- 
cluding both banks of the Mississippi River, from Cape 
Girardeau to New Madrid, and on the Ohio it included 
the whole of Western Kentucky. A glance at the map 
discloses the strategic importance of Cairo, as a base of 
operations for a southern advance, and of vital importance 
in the line of defence for the extensive and rich country 
lying between the Ohio and the Mississippi. It is esj^e- 
cially valuable for river exi)editions, the transi^ortation 
of supplies, and the equipment of a gunboat fleet. The 
parallel flow of the Tennessee and Cumberland north- 
ward into the Ohio also includes a most important por- 
tion of West Kentucky, which Grant saw at a glance was 
to become the scene of immediate hostilities. 



20 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

Grant was now in his element ; he not onlj^ accom- 
plished with alacrity what he was ordered to do, but he 
made work for his troops. He at once displayed that en- 
ergy Avhich he has never abated for an instant during the 
war. 

The attempted and absurd neutrality of Kentucky was 
one-sided ; it was to keep Union troops away and let 
rebels attack.* The latter were not slow in availing them- 
selves of this privilege. Seizing, first Hickman, and then 
Columbus and Bowling Green, and fortifying the Tennes- 
see at Fort Henry, and the Cumberland at Fort Donelson, 
they established a first strong line from the Mississippi to 
Virginia in the "neutral" State of Kentucky. Grant 
followed their lead in sending, on the 6th of September, a 
strong force to Paducah, where the Tennessee empties 
into the Ohio, under command of General C. F. Smith, 
much to the chagrin of the secessionists there, who were • 
awaiting a rebel force. In the same manner he occupied 
Smithland, near the mouth of the Cumberland, and thus 
made two vital moves in the game which was to cry 
checkmate at Fort Donelson. These points were also val- 
uable to the rebels as gateways of supplies. From the 
places now occupied Grant at once busied himself in mak- 
ing numerous reconnoissances in every direction, until at 
length he was ready to try his '"prentice hand" upon 
the rebels. When all was ready he moved down the 
river to Belmont, opposite Columbus, and there the first 
battle took place. The origin of that movement may be 
tlius bricfiy stated : — 

* And yet this neutrality was reproached by the rebels. Pollard says 
("First Year of the War," p. 183): "If, a few months back, any one had 
predicted, that in an armed contest between the North and the South, the 
State of Kentucky would be found acting with the former, and abetting and 
assisting a war upon States united with her by community of institutions, 
of interests, and of blood, in any Southern company in whicli such a 
speech was adventured he would, most [irobably, have been liooted at <»« 
a fool or chastised as a slanderer." 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 21 

General Fremont, under date iN'ovember 1, 1861, di- 
rected Grant to make demonstrations "along both sides 
of the river towards Charleston, Norfolk, and Blandville." 
On the 2d, he was thus informed by Fremont: "Jeff. 
Thompson is at Indian's ford of the St. Francois River, 
twenty-five miles below Greenville, with about three 
thousand men. Colonel Carlin has started with a force 
from Pilot Knob. Send a force from Cape Girardeau 
and Bird's Point to assist Carlin in driving Thompson 
into Arkansas." Incident to these instructions, Grant 
sent Colonel Oglesby, with the Eighth Illinois, four com- 
panies of the Eleventh Illinois, the whole of the Eigli- 
teenth and Twenty-ninth, and three companies of cavalry, 
to go to Commerce, Missouri, thence to Sikeston, and 
pursue Jeff. Thompson (in conjunction with a force from 
Ironton). On the 5th, he was informed that Polk was 
re-enforcing Price's army from Columbus. In this com- 
plication of circumstances he determined to threaten Co- 
lumbus and attack Belmont. Oglesby was deflected to 
New Madrid, and Colonel W. H. L. "Wallace sent to re- 
enforce him. The object of the attack then was to cut 
off the rebel line in Kentucky from Price' s forces in Mis- 
souri, and also to keep Polk from interfering with the 
detachments Grant had sent out in pursuit of Jeff. 
Thompson. 

Grant directed General C. F. Smith to make a dem- 
onstration upon Columbus from Paducah, and then him- 
self sent down a small force on the Kentucky side to 
EUicott's Mills, about twelve miles from Columbus. 
Having taken these precautions to deceive the enemy, 
he embarked his expeditionary force at Cairo on the 6th 
of November — three thousand one hundred and fourteen 
men,* chiefly Illinois volunteers, with the Seventh Iowa, 

* McClernand's Brigade (Twentv-seventh, Tliirtieth, Thirty-first Illi- 
nois), with cavalry. Dougherty's Brigade, Twenty-second Illinois, Seventh 
Iowa. — GranVa Revised Report, June 26, 1805. 



22 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

upon four boats, convoyed by the gunboats Lexington, 
Captain Stembel, and Tyler, Captain Walker in com- 
mand, the gunboats in advance. Moving with due cau- 
tion, they reached Island No. 1, eleven miles above Co- 
lumbus, that night, and lay against the Kentucky shore. 
It was then he heard that Polk was crossing troops to Bel- 
mont to cut off Oglesby. The next morning he moved 
to Hunter' s Point, two miles above Belmont, on the Mis- 
souri shore, where his troops Avere landed and formed into 
column of attack. 

The rebel forces at Columbus were commanded by 
Major-General Leonidas Polk, a bishop of the Protestant 
Episcopal Church, the purity of whose lawn is forever 
stained with blood drawn by carnal weapons ; a weak 
but brave man, whose West Point education was at 
least worth something to the rebel cause. Polk had 
posted a small force on the right bank, to keep open his 
communications, and, as soon as he had wind of Grant's 
movement, and Smith's demonstration to Maysfield, he 
expected an attack on Columbus, or at least in Kentucky. 
Indeed, until the close of the engagement, he apiDrehended 
an attack in his rear. 

Grant's movement took him somewhat b}^ surprise. 
From the point of debarkation, one battalion having been 
left as a reserve near the transports, the troops were 
marched by flank towards Belmont, and drawn up in line 
of battle about a mile from Belmont. Skirmishers were 
then thrown forwaid, who soon encountered Colonel 
Tappan's rebel force, consisting of three regiments, re- 
enforced by Pillow with three more, and the general 
engagement took place. Deploying his entire force as 
skirmishers. Grant drove the enemy back, fighting from 
tree to tree, for about two miles, until he reached the 
intrenched camp protected by slashed timber as an abatis. 
In rear of this, oi)i>osiiig our left, were tlu; Tliirteenth 
Arkansas and the iS'inth Tennessee: and on the right 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 23 

was Beltzhoover's "battery of seven guns and Colonel 
Wright's regiment, Tliis did not check our impetuous 
advance. Charging over it with great ardor, our men 
drove the enemy to the river-bank, and many of them 
into their transports, and were in possession of every 
thing.* But as Belmont is on low ground, entirely com- 
manded by the guns from Columbus, it was manifest that 
the ground thus gained could not be held, and therefore 
Grant fired the encampment, burning tents, blankets, and 
stores, and began his return movement with captured artil- 
lery, prisoners, and horses. But the end of our success 
on the field had been attained. Major- General Polk, who 
was now quite alive to the situation, directed his heaviest 
guns from Coluinbus upon our troops. He had already 
sent over three f regiments in one body, under General Pil- 
low ; these were supported by three others, under Gen- 
eral Cheatham, which landed some distance above, be- 
tween our soldiers and the boats. Further to crush Grant' s 
small force, the bishop, although sadly afraid of an attack 
on his rear at Columbus, took over two regiments in per- 
son to aid Pillow's panic-stricken force. But by this 
time Grant was in retreat to his boats, and only faced to 
the right and rear to punish Cheatham's flankers, and a 
portion of Pillow's, under Colonel Marks, who had 
marched up the river-bank, and endeavored to prevent 
his return to the boats. In that retreat we sufi'ered very 
severely, our troops being hard pressed by overpower- 
ing numbers. At five in the afternoon our troops had 
re-embarked, and were on their way to Cairo, while the 

* The rebel excuse is, that they were out of ammunition ; good, but 
not new. Pollard says: "In this movement Pillow's line was more or 
less broken, and his corps mingled together, so that when they reached 
the river-bank, they had the appearance of a mass of men rather than an 
organized corps." — First Year, p. 201. 

+ Pollard sa.js four regiments, but we give the rebels the benetit of 
clergy, as the bishop says three. 



24 GRANT AXD HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

rebels, checked by the fire of our gunboats, glared like 
baffled tigers, and went back to their smoking camp. 
We had left two caissons, but had brought oflf two 
guns of Beltzhoover' s battery. We had eighty -five 
killed, three hundred and one (many slightly) wounded, 
and about ninety-nine missing. The gunboats, whose 
duty was primarily to cover the landing and protect the 
transports, and also, as far as possible, to engage the 
Columbus batteries, performed their service to General 
Grant's entire satisfaction. The Confederate loss was six 
hundred and thirty-two (Pollard, "First Year of the 
War"). Both parties claimed a victory, but on the 
i-ecovery of the field and pursuit of our retiring columns 
the rebels base their claims to a success, which we need 
not disj)ute.* Although, in comparison with subsequent 
engagements, Belmont seems a small affair, it has an 
importance peculiarly its own. 

I. — It was a cowp d'essai of our new General. While 
others of his rank were playing quite subordinate parts in 
large annies. Grant was making an independent expedi- 
tion in command, outwitting the enemy, burning his 
camp, retreating successfully when overpowered, and 
eff'ecting his purpose in a most soldierly manner. 

II. — Again, it was a trial of our new troops in the 
AYest, and they acquitted themselves so as to elicit the 
hearty praise of their commander and the countr}^ They 
fought well in the attack, from colonels to privates, f in 
tlie retreat, and in cutting their way through Cheatham's 
force, and were never for a moment discouraged. 

III. — The objects of the expedition, — to prevent the 
enemy from sending a force to Missouri to cut off our de- 

* In a letter to his fiithor (November 8th), Grant says, " I can say 
with gratification, that every cohmol, witliout a single exception, set an 
example to their commands," &c. 

t General McClornand's "Official Report." McClernand had three 
horses shot under him. 




>2^ 



>? ,/X:^.,-^<f 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 25 

tachments whicli were pressing Thompson, and to prevent 
his re-enforcing Price, — were fully accomplished. Grant 
had given him a TdIow whicli kept him concentrated lest 
another might soon follow. 

IV.— It demonstrated the weakness of the enemy, and 
was the prologue of the victory of Fort Donelson, and the 
piercing of the rebels' line, which threw it back almost 
upon the Gulf. 

Of the 23ersonal prowess of General Grant, as evinced 
in this battle, it is now needless to speak ; it was of the 
highest order. He, as well as General McClernand, had 
a horse shot under him, and amid the crashing projectiles 
of heavy guns from Columbus and Belmont, and the fatal 
storm of musketry, " the gallant conduct of his troops was 
stimulated by his presence and inspii-ed by his exam- 
ple."* 

* June 26, 1865, General Grant submitted to the Secretary of War a 
fresh report, to take the place of the old one. 



26 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE LIEUTENANT-GENERAL— RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT. 

On the 2d of March, 1864, Grant was confirmed by the 
United States Senate, in Executive session, as Lieutenant- 
General in the Army of the United States. This put him 
over all our other generals, but did not, "without a special 
order, make him commander-in-chief of our armies. 

At five o'clock on the afternoon of Tuesday, the 8th, 
he arrived in Washington to receive his commission. He 
seated himself, unnoticed, at the dinner-table of Wil- 
lard' s Hotel ; but being discovered by a gentleman who 
had seen him in New Orleans — for his face was not even 
then familiar to Washington people — he was brought to 
his feet by the cry that "the hero of Vicksburg was in 
the room," and by a stonn of cheers which might well 
bewilder so modest a man. In the evening he attended 
the President's levee, where he was the observed of all 
observers. 

On the afternoon of the 9th, at one o'clock, he was 
received by the President in the cabinet chamber, and 
was presented with the commission. In any one of the 
old European monarchies, the presentation would have 
been made among the grandest surroundings. In ancient 
Rome it would have been inaugurated by a triumph like 
that in which Titus joined his father after the famous cap- 
ture of Jerusalem. 

But tlie scene was more in keeping witli our republi- 
can manners and the still undecided issues of the war. 
It was no time for ])ageaiits : tlu^re was no brilliant gath- 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 27 

ering, no splendid staff. There were the President and 
his entire cabinet ; General Halleck, the retiring comman- 
der-in-chief ; General Rawlings, Grant's chief-of-staff ; 
Colonel Comstock, his chief-engineer ; Mr. Nicolay, the 
President's private secretary; and the Honorable Owen 
Lovejoy, of Illinois. It was eminently proper that one 
other person should be present, and that was the Gen- 
eral's eldest son, a fine boy of fourteen, the inheritor of 
his father's glory, and who with such an example and 
such training may well be incited to a life of usefulness, 
and perhaps fame. 

When General Grant entered the Executive chamber 
he was cordially received by the President, and present- 
ed to the cabinet. Mr. Lincoln then addressed him in the 
following words : — 

"General Grant:— The nation's appreciation of 
what you have done, and its reliance upon you for what 
remains to be done in the existing great struggle, are now 
presented with this commission, constituting you Lieuten- 
ant-General in the Army of the United States. With this 
high honor devolves upon you also a corresponding 
responsibility. As the country herein trusts you, so, 
under God, it will sustain you. I scarcely need to add, 
that, with what I here speak for the nation, goes my own 
hearty personal concurrence." 

For once in his life, and we believe for the onl}^ time, 
the General could not refuse to make a speech ; but what 
he said was very brief, and to the point ; the words, 
which have a peculiar significance in the light of the great 
events which have since transpired, were these : — 

"Mr. President: — I accept the commission, with 
gratitude for the high honor conferred. With the aid of 
the noble armies that have fought on so many fields for 
our common countr}^, it will be my earnest endeavor not to 
disappoint your expectations. I feel the full weight of 
the responsibilities now devolving on me, and I know 



28 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

tliat if they are met, it will be due to those armies, and, 
above all, to the favor of that Providence which leads 
both nations and men," 

Introductions followed; half an hour was spent in 
conversation with the Secretaries, and this simple but im- 
portant interview was ended. 

Making a rapid visit with General Meade to the Army 
of the Potomac on the 10th, he started on the morning of 
the 11th for the West, and on the 12th a special order of 
the President assigned the new Lieutenant-General to the 
command of all the armies. 

And here we may pause for a moment to consider what 
all this signified. 

The revival of this rank of lieutenant-general recalls 
to us the circumstances under which it had been before 
conferred in America, and which marked two important 
periods in our history. In 1798, incident to the threaten- 
ing aspect of our relations with France, the Congress had 
conferred it upon Washington, who, in the next year, had 
he lived, would have been a full general, the only sensi- 
ble and logical rank which a commander-in-chief should 
hold. Upon Washington's death, the rank was discon- 
tinued. 

In the long years from February, 1849, to December, 
1852, earnest efforts were made to confer this grade, by 
brevet, on General Winfield Scott, for his long and illus- 
trious services to the country ; but his enemies were inge- 
nious and malignant, and among them the most pertinacious 
was the then Honorable Jefferson Davis. 

These two great men were the only predecessors of 
Grant, for whom the full rank was now revived. 

The bill reviving it was introduced into the Lower 
House by Grant's constant friend, the Honorable Mr. 
Washburn»% and being refern^d to the ;Nrilitary Committee, 
was slightly amended, and finally presented to the House 
in tlu? f()llowin.i2; form : — 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 29 

"5e it enacted hij the Senate and House of Represent- 
atives of the United States of America in Congress as- 
sembled, That tlie grade of Lieutenant- General T^e, and the 
same is hereby, revived in the Army of the United States 
of America ; and the President is hereby authorized, 
whenever he shall deem it expedient, to appoint, by and 
with the advice and consent of the Senate, a commander 
of the army, to be selected during war, from among those 
officers in the military service of the United States, not 
below the grade of Major-General, most distinguished for 
courage, skill, and ability ; and who, being commissioned 
as Lieutenant-General, shall be autJiorized, under the di- 
rection of the President, to command the armies of the 
United States. 

" Sec. 2. And be it further enacted, That the Lieuten- 
ant- General appointed as is hereinbefore provided, shall 
be entitled to the pay, allowances, and staff specified in 
the fifth section of the act approved May 28th, 1798 ; and 
also the allowances described in the sixth section of the 
act approved August 23d, 1842, granting additional rations 
to certain officers : Provided, That nothing in this bill 
contained shall be construed in any way to affect the rank, 
pay, or allowances of \Yinfield Scott, Lieutenant-General 
by brevet, now on the retired list of the army." 

To this, while in the course of debate, Mr. Ross offered 
an amendment recommending General Grant for the origi- 
nal vacancy. Mr. Washburne's speech in favor of the 
amended bill is a masterly and eloquent exposition of the 
services of General Grant, and his high eulogium has been 
vindicated in detail by the after history. The opposition 
was very small ; a triumphant majority of one hundred and 
seventeen to nineteen votes sent it to the Senate, who con- 
firmed it, and on the 1st of March the President approved 
the bill and nominated Grant. On the second, as we have 
said, the Senate, in Executive session, confirmed him. Let 
us add that the country, with one voice, hailed and sane- 



30 GRANT AXD HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

tioned the appointment, the most important ever made in 
America. 

Perhaps we could select no better time to give some 
delineations of the presence and person of the General 
thus honored. 

He was not quite fortj^-three years of age, of medium 
height, and strong, well-knit frame. His appearance, at 
first sight, is not striking. Careless of dress, and with 
no grandeur of air or imposing carriage, he Avould not 
attract a casual observer in a crowd ; but a study of liis 
face while conversing with him would satisfy a physiog- 
nomist, even without a knowledge of his history, that 
he is no ordinary man. His hair is full, brown, worn 
short, parted at the side over a full forehead, slightly 
prominent, but not protuberant at the brows. He has a 
good nose, relieved from the elegant weakness of the 
Grecian by a slight curve ; blue eyes, sad, but neither 
dreamy nor stupid, which dilate into bold expression in 
times of action and danger ; a firm, evenly-closed mouth, 
which would express more if free from beard ; a beard of 
reddish brown, cut close, evidently for comfort, and for 
that readiness of action with wliieh the razor interferes ; 
and a square, but not projecting, jaw and chin. Tlie face, 
in spite of former critics, tells to my mind its own story 
fully. I see in it will, energy, a sense of responsibility, 
reticence, and entire self-control. If any have doubted it, 
let them study the best photographs again, and they will 
be convinced. 

To pass from his physiognomy to his character. He is 
a man of irreproachable life and habits ; pure, humane, 
and geniu-ous. His everlasting cigar deserves a place in 
histoiy, for it is a part of the man ; he is ni^ver without 
it, and his cigars are very strong ; but excess in tobacco 
depends upon the constitution, and it evidently suits 
Grant. He is eiitiivly without ostentation in his house 
and table, and his able staff is kept for use and not show. 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 31 

In many of his orders and dispatches he has devoutly 
recognized the providence of God, and his reliance upon 
it, as being the chief strength of nations and men ; and if 
he ever swears, the religious world may he certified that 
his oaths are in the same category with those of my Uncle 
Toby and of Washington at Monmouth. He is phleg- 
matic, but not insensible ; cool, but not without enthu- 
siasm ; habitually grave, with a simple dignity, but easily 
approachable by all, even to the poorest private ; in 
speech, laconic, but unaffected ; no official non-committal 
about him ; clear-headed, forgetting nothing, arranging 
details easily in his capacious brain, without much reli- 
ance upon red tape ; blushing when praised, and bearing 
both praise and blame with silent magnanimity. Above 
all, he combines what Guizot has called the "genius of 
common sense," with a determination to "go ahead." 

Such, in brief, was the man who had made himself a 
model hero for the American people ; such the man who 
had come to Washington, on his own merits, but not by 
his own solicitation, to be made lieutenant-general and 
commander-in-chief. In the words of Mr. Washburne, 
"iVb man loith Ms consent lias ever mentioned Ms name 
in connection loith any position. I say what I know to 
be true, when I allege that every promotion he has re- 
ceived since he first entered the service to put down this 
rebellion was moved without his knowledge or consent ; 
and in regard to this very matter of lieutenant-general, 
after the hill was introduced and Ms name mentioned in 
connection therewitJi^ lie wrote me and admonislied me 
that he had been highly honored already hy the Govern- 
ment, and- did not asTc or deserve any thing more in the 
shape of honors or promotion ; and that a success over 
the enemy loas what he craved above every thing else ; 
that he only desired to hold such an influence over those 
under his command as to use them to the best advantage 
to secure that end.'''' But the country had need of him ; 



32 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

the Government could not do without him, and so they 
saved themselves by honoring Grant. 

And here, while he stands in our narrative at the part- 
ing of the ways, let us briefly advert to the retrosj^ect, 
and then glance at the prospect before him. 

First, let us see what he had done to make himself, in 
violation of the maxim of the French philosopher,* a 
necessary man to the American people. From the day of 
his second entry into service as a colonel of volunteers, 
he had been continually in the field, and not sunning his 
uniform in the streets of our great cities ; he had been 
constantly enlarging his sphere of action. His name 
became speedily known to the country, and the laconic 
philosoph}^ of his dispatches gave the people something 
to take hold of and ring the chimes upon ; some unde- 
signedly eloquent epigram of each great victory. At Fort 
Donelson, the "unconditional surrender" which he de- 
manded gave a new significance to the initial letters of 
his name. " I propose to move immediately upon your 
works," struck a popular chord. Hard jDressed at Pitts- 
burg Landing, he told Sherman a characteristic story on 
the field, illustrating the secret of victory, and ordered 
him to assume the offensive. 

After the great campaign which concluded witli the 
capture of Vicksburg, he received from President Lincoln 
an autograph letter, magnanimously confessing that he 
had not been in favor of the plan of camjDaign, and end- 
ing thus : "I now wish to make a personal acknowledg- 
ment, that you were right and I was wrong." He had 
ojiejied the Mississippi from the head-waters to the mud- 
islands of the Delta. 

In really serious straits at Chattanooga, his animals 
dying by thousands, and his men in danger of starving 
— not, however, by any fault of his own. for he only 

* La Rocliefoucauld says: "II n'y u ptis d'huinino nL-ccssaire." 



GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 33 

assumed command to find the situation sucli— he had 
received Bragg' s merciful message to remove the non- 
combatants, and had lieard Bragg' s characteristic boast 
that in three days' time Grant's army would be flying in 
hungry disorder to Nashville ; whereas, in three days' 
time, Bragg' s disordered hosts, flanked and beaten in 
front, were flying southward before Grant's attack. 

He had asked for nothing from the Government ; had 
refused to make capital by making speeches ; would not 
be approached on political questions ; escaped, except 
when cornered, from public demonstrations, public din- 
ners, and the like ; and now the young man, unknown to 
the public four years before — wood-dealer, collector, 
farmer, leather-dealer, and yet always an honest man and 
a gentleman— had come to AVashington to receive his 
reward, the very greatest to which an American had ever 
attained. 

But it was something far more and far di^erent. We 
have glanced at the retrospect : let us look for a moment 
at the nature of the prospect— not simply, as before, one 
of partial trial and danger and glory, but of a sole and 
crushing responsibility. As his hand grasped the glitter- 
ing wreath it turned magically into a flaming sword, and 
a voice, like apocalyptic thunders, cried "Onward!" 
The stars shone, indeed, but only to disclose dimly in the 
darkness new dangers, new struggles, vigils never inter- 
mitted ; and it was a very bold man indeed, one of sleep- 
less soul, indomitable courage, and undying patriotism, 
who, amid the roaring Red Sea of battle, the breakers of 
official dictation, the misapprehensions of profound plans 
by an impatient and impressible public, w^io savr only 
the surface, and last, but not least, the Syrtis Miijor of 
politics, could assume such a charge at such a time, even 
with all its lionors. Would he flutte? and flounder and 
fall, like the historical dignitaries of other days, and like 
the many experimental generals of our own times, who 
3 



34 GRANT AND HIS CAMPAIGNS. 

were tasked above their powers, and failed miserably^ 
Or would lie succeed completely, and achieve a colossal, 
an unrivalled fame ? Surely, in the latter case, would be 
applicable to him the words uttered by the eloquent 
TuUy to the clement Csesar, in which he declares, that in 
the praise then accorded, the great general has neither 
rival nor sharers ; it is beyond the grasp of cohort, cen- 
turion, or imperator. He stands alone. 



THE WORK WILL BE ILLUSTRATED 



SPLENDID STEEL PORTRAITS 



Lieutenant-General U. S. GRANT. 

Major-General W. T. Sherman. | Major-General Jas. B. McPherson. 
Major-General George G. Meade. { Major-General G. H. Thomas. 
Major-Gexeral p. H. Sheridan. [ Major-General E. 0. C. Ord. 
Brevet Major-General J. A. Rawlins. 



CAREFULLY PREPARED MAPS, 

ENGRAVED ON STONE, 



The Siege of ^icksburg. 

The Battle of Pittsburgh Landing. 
The Battle of Chattanooga. 

Sheridan's Valley Campaign. 

Battles around Richmond. 

Furnished for the purpose by Brevet Brigadier-General C. B. Comstock, Chief 
Engineer. 

together with 

diagr,a.m:s, pi^^ns, &c., &c. 



PROSPECTUS 

OF 
AND 

HIS CAMPAIGNS 

A 

MILITAEY BIOGEAPHY. 

By HEXRY COPP^E, A. M., 

EDITOR OF THE "UNITED STATES SERVICE MAGAZIXE." 

1 fVol. 8vo, about 500 Pages. Price $3.50, 
\^^IXII STEEL. PORXRi^IT'S, M:A.FS, PLAINS, &:C. 



This 19 a book which even- American citizen will desire to possess. The his- 
tory of this great leader of the "Armies of the Union" has become the property 
of the nation lie has done so much to save, and is imperishably incorporated in 
its annals. 

The mere mention of Fort Donelson, Shiloh. Corinth, Icka, Vicksburg, 
Chattanooga, The Wilderness, Spottstlvania, The North Anna, Cold Har- 
bor, Petersburg, RICH^toND. recalls to mind^ie past exultations over these suc- 
cesses, while the surrender of Lee and anal suppression of the Rebellion crown 
all these arduous Campaigns with faithfully earned victory. 

During the heat and excitement of the contest, while history was so rapidly be- 
ing made, no time could be spared to record these great deeds; but now, the war 
being over, and peace again restored to us, it is proper that such great services 
should have a fitting record. 

This work will l^e in every particular trustworthy and accurate — written by the 
Lieutenant-General's life-long friend, from official documents put exclusively into 
his hands, it cannot fail to meet every requirement of the public expectation. 

It is being prepared in the most thorough manner, will be printed on fine paper, 
and handsomely bound, and be illustrated with valuable Portraits on steel, and by 
Maps and Plans prepared by Brevet Brig.-Gen'l C. B. Comstock, Chief Engineer. 

For a more detailed description of the work see the " Prefatory Letter " from 
the Author. 

No one who has participated in these extraordinary Cnrnpaigns will be willing 
to be without this book : and the relatives and friends of these participants will 
find it a work of absorbiug interest. It is a record of which every .Vmerieau citi- 
zen will be justly proud. 

"it will be sold exclusively bt subscription, 
And cannot be had except through our duly authorized agents. Hence those 
desiring a copy for their libraries should subscribe promptly when the oppor- 
tunity is presented. It will not be for sale in tlie book-stores. 

It is now in pi-ess, and will be read i/ for deliicnj in Uciober, at the following rates: — 

Miusliii Bound, - «i3.50 

Half Calf, - i*"^>." -- DiSa 

0. B. EICHARDbON. Publisher, 

:..lii HROADW.VV. NEW VORK. 

Wo, the subscribers, wiii ta). J una ;'i.> .i-r ilm number of copies of the above 
work set against our respective names, when delivered in accordance with the 
above conditions; (his Progjiectus volume to represent the styles of binding, size, 
and general ineclianical execution of the work. 



. fa 




Author - -S^oppeey--^"* ""/l 

Grant and his B. 

Title ..-.-C.S^S>^^M^=szz=s^^ss^^^^ 



LIBRARY 
NAVY DEPARTMENT 

Room 2730 



Books must be returned within 
two weeks 



8. OOVERMHENT r^lINTIMO OmCB: 1926 



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